


A Chosen Path

by Skullszeyes



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alice in Wonderland References, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arguing, Bonding, Child Abandonment, Child Neglect, Crying, Family, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff, Gen, Guilt, Happy Ending, Humor, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Nightmares, Regret, Responsibility, Sarcasm, Whining, Wonderland, Wonderland (Once Upon a Time)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2019-09-19
Packaged: 2020-10-21 17:53:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20697611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skullszeyes/pseuds/Skullszeyes
Summary: Jefferson has a hard time dealing with his daughter, Grace, but he does have guilt about always leaving her, which gives him the idea to bring her to a place where they can retrieve an item, one that helped him in the past.





	A Chosen Path

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea, and it kept bothering me so much that I couldn't sleep...I woke up three times in thirty minutes. I've always liked Jefferson & Grace. This father-daughter bonding stuff is adorable, and I wanted to write Jefferson being sarcastic, and not being good at caring for his daughter, but he feels guilty for what he does. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy.
> 
> Comments and/or Kudo's are appreciative.

Jefferson rolls his eyes and groans as he senses her drawing close. She may be small and quiet, but he’s been around many, and has the intuition to know when he’s no longer alone. 

“I found you,” she says, peeking her brown head around the tree, smiling up at him. 

“I wasn’t hiding,” Jefferson tells her as Grace, his daughter, walks around the tree and stops in front of him. She’s wearing a beige dress with a painted floral pink cloak, and leather boots. 

“Hello, Papa,” Grace says, her smile a ray of light in Jefferson’s eyes.

He looks away. “Hello, Grace.” 

She steps closer, “What are you doing?”

“Apparently, I’m hiding, but in truth, I wanted to get away.”

“From what?”

Jefferson turned his head and smiled at her. 

Grace smiled back. “Are you coming home soon? I don’t like being alone.”

“How could I say no to that small cute face,” Jefferson said, leaning over to pinch her soft cheek before dropping his smile, “unfortunately, I have business elsewhere, and until then, you’re going to have to amuse yourself while I’m gone.”

He stands from the tree stump he had been sitting on, and in the past, smoothed out to stop the edges from poking into his leg.

Grace frowns at him. “Can I come with you?”

“No.” Jefferson walked past her. 

“Please…” Grace says, following behind, and pouting. 

Jefferson sighed, teeth clenched, trying his hardest to reel in his annoyance before swiftly turning around. “Look, Grace, it would be better if you stayed home where I know where you are.” 

“But I want to be with you.” And to Jefferson’s continued distress, Grace hugged him.

He raised his chin, and closed his eyes. Why was parenting getting more exhausting as the days went on? “Grace, let’s not do this. Okay. I really don’t need this at the moment.”

“I don’t want you to leave me again,” Grace said. “Please, don’t leave, Papa.”

Jefferson sighed, then he peeled her arms away from his waist, and gave her a small smile. “I’m not leaving you, Grace, it’ll only be a few hours, and that’s all. By the time I get back, you’ll probably be—”

“No,” Grace glared, “you always say that, sometimes you don’t come back at all for days, and I’m stuck eating mushrooms!”

Jefferson turned around and frowned at her sprinting along the path, through the trees, and back to their cottage. “Sleeping, I was going to say, sleeping.” 

He keeps a leisure pace as he walks home, and he knows for sure he isn’t cut out to be a parent. His own child seems to have a misplaced sense of hope in him, which makes him feel useless. He’s not able to feed her, clothe her as she grows older, and there’s barely any jobs to take when his previous profession was working for the Queen. 

He thought of taking a job from her, but lately, he noticed the danger it brought him after Grace’s mother died, and he knew he couldn’t have his own daughter wandering this ugly world. At least she stayed near the cottage when he told her too, and didn’t talk to anyone she wasn’t meant to speak too. 

It was still difficult to keep up with her every need. 

This was no different. Before, she was fine with him leaving, but now...things have changed. And it was getting annoying. 

“Grace,” Jefferson calls as he enters the cottage, arching a brow at Grace who was glaring, not particularly at him, but most likely still directed at him while she stuffed a small bag full of clothes. “What are you doing?” he asked, closing the door behind him. 

“I’m going with you,” Grace says, munching on a cookie from her bag, still glaring, but not looking at him.

Jefferson grimaced at her. “No, you’re not. You’re not going anywhere, you’re going to stay here, and wait for me.”

“No!”

“Grace.” Jefferson met her glare, and it wasn’t as startling as most he had come across, not as threatening as the Queen’s he met on his path.

Her glare smoothed out and she bit her lip, her eyes watering. “Please don’t leave me, Papa!” And then she got up from where she was knelt and raced over to him, embracing him again. However, this time, he brought her into his arms while she whimpered in his shoulder.

“You’ll be fine until I return,” he said, rubbing her back. 

“No, I won’t,” she said. “All I need is you, Papa. Please don’t leave me alone again.”

Jefferson sat down on a chair, holding Grace in his lap. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do with her. She won’t stop crying and whining, and even if he did leave while she slept, he won’t hear the end of it when he returns. 

“You know what, maybe I’ll bring you with me this time.”

“You will?” Grace muttered, slowly falling asleep.

“Yes,” Jefferson said, “I won’t bring you anywhere dangerous...at least not too dangerous.”

“Where will we go?” she asked him. “Wonderland?”

Jefferson wrinkled his nose at the suggestion. “I’d rather not, but maybe it would be a good life experience.”

“When?” she asked him.

“After you wake up,” he said, rising from the chair and lying her down in her bed, covering her up with the blankets. 

“Don’t leave, Papa,” Grace whispered.

Jefferson stood beside her bed, frowning down at her face. She looked a lot like her mother. Except, after awhile, she started to act more like him, which made sense, he was her last living relative.

He sighed, slowly turning away and walking over to her bag. “This is why I didn’t want to bring you,” he said, pulling out the clothes and cookies she had stuffed into the bag, “different worlds are ruled by different laws. I’d have to be careful, usually children are dangerous to jump through portals with, but Wonderland shouldn’t be all bad.”

He scowled at the idea of what he was about to do. Once he got her clothes situated, and cleaned up the mess. Jefferson located his coat, and hat. He sat down in the chair, frowning at the hat that helped him jump into portals.

He had done it many times, mostly for jobs.

This would be in the similar vein, but he hoped he could hide a bit of it from Grace. He closed his eyes and let himself drift into sleep for awhile. And what he dreamed of was more akin to a nightmare that coldly wrapped around his body. 

Grace had been left behind, and he couldn’t find his way back to her. It was his fault. He was supposed to be protecting her, keeping her company, but he failed so badly that it was impossible to fix.

_ “I’m sorry, Grace, I’m sorry that I couldn’t come back to you...I’m sorry.” _

“Papa?” 

Jefferson’s eyes flashed open and he almost rose to his feet until he heard Grace’s startled scream. He turned his head while his heart raced painfully in his chest. 

“You had a nightmare,” she whispered, cautiously stepping closer to him. 

He nodded slowly, staring at her. “I’m sorry...I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Grace leaned over and embraced him like she had the other day, except this was meant to be comforting. Jefferson closed his eyes and leaned into her, he was shaking, his heart racing, the thoughts were uncontrollable. 

He left her, and he couldn’t come back. 

Before, the idea was fleeting, but he was always assured he’d make it back. He was a portal jumper, not an idiot. The dream felt real enough that he had fallen to his knees, tears falling along his face, while his own heart broke apart that he had abandoned her for greed. 

“Thank you, Grace,” he whispered. 

She pulled away from him and smiled warmly. “You kept calling my name...did you have a bad dream about me?” 

Jefferson forced a smile, “In a way, but it was just a dream.”

Grace was wearing a different floral dress than the one she wore the other day. Even the front of her hair had been braided, and a small flower clip kept it in place. He could even see a satchel sitting on the table. 

“What did you pack, more clothes?” he asked her, hoping to ignore the shaking. 

“Food,” Grace said, opening the bag and revealing a group of apples and bread. “I was going to bring berries, but I didn’t want them ending up squished in my bag.” She turned and smiled at him. “So, I ate them.”

Jefferson nodded, holding his hat. “Alright, we won’t be gone long. Maybe an hour or so...then we’ll come back.”

“Why an hour?” she asked. “Sometimes you’re gone for—”

“Days, I know,” Jefferson sighed. “You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?”

Grace smiled and took Jefferson’s hand. It was small and comforting, and he didn’t want to say it, but the nightmare had truly shaken him. It had brought on a fear he had pushed down many times, and that one moment, he had let his guard down and the dream manifested. 

He didn’t want that to become a reality.

Jefferson tossed the hat down and held Grace's hand. They watched the portal grow wider, and they jumped in.

Grace shrieked, curling her fingers into his coat, while she tightened her hand that held his. He lifted her, and when it was time to land, he planted his feet on the ground and lowered her down.

"You’re going to have to work on that,” he said, reaching down for the hat, and placing it on the top of his head.

Grace kept close to him with wobbly legs. Her eyes widened with wonder at the large room with many doors of shape and size, the wood was even a different color, some were metal, others were charred. There was even a distinct smell that came from each one.

“How do you know which one to pick?” she asked as he led her toward a small pink door with a golden handle. 

“Most of them are locked,” he told her, “but Wonderland’s door is conveniently opened, depends on the day, of course.”

He didn’t want to explain it to her, it would take awhile, and he’d rather not think about it too much as he pressed his hand on the doorknob and twisted it. The door opened, and Grace looked up at him. 

“I thought it was small.”

The door was now as tall as Jefferson. “It does that, you’ll get used to it.” With a sigh, he led his daughter into Wonderland. The world itself was bright and saturated. The sky was a bright blue, and the heat was relentless, while the trees gave little relief as he held Grace’s hand and led her along a pathway.

“This is Wonderland?” she asked.

“A partial,” he said, “but it’s not as great as you might think.” His eyes burned from the colors. 

As they walked along the pathway, or whatever path that was there, a thick fog began to grow, and the colors began to fade into a dark grey and blue. 

“What’s going on?” she asked him, keeping close to him. They had let go of each other’s hands a few minutes ago, and she was now holding onto his coat.

“Day cycles are faster than ours,” he said, slowing his pace when he felt something strange. Another presence was close by, and Jefferson stopped in the middle of the path as he stared up at two bulbous yellow eyes. 

“Hatter,” the purple and blue cat appeared in the fog, its body slowly forming, its smile was as menacing as always, “you’ve returned to Wonderland, couldn’t stay away, could you?”

Jefferson gave it a flat stare, “I’m not here on a social visit.”

“Oh,” the cat said, drifting down from the tree, it’s form was large, but it seemed to have grown small as it noticed Grace standing beside Jefferson, “I see, is this the reason, you’ve brought darling Alice back to Wonderland.”

“Yeah, she’s not Alice,” Jefferson tells the cat as he pulls Grace behind him. 

“Not Alice?” the cat twirls through the air, its body fading in and out around them. “Are you sure, Hatter? That this young girl is not Al—”

“Grace.”

“Alice!”

“Grace.”

“Alice.”

“Her name is Grace, not Alice. I haven’t seen Alice since she left Wonderland, so quit calling my daughter Alice.” He glared at the cat, “Her name is Grace!”

The cat chuckled, floating upward to the branch. “Why didn’t you start with that, Hatter?”

Grace tugged on his coat. “Who’s Alice?”

“No one.”

She glared, and he ignored her by leading Grace away from the cat that finally faded along with the fog. 

“You lived here before?” she asked when they got far enough away. 

“I stayed for a bit,” Jefferson said, taking her hand. “The girl, Alice, was here during that time, she stopped the Queen that rules this realm, and afterwards, I left.” 

“Why did you stay for that long?” she asked. 

It was a long time ago, and Alice was a young woman, determined in her conviction to stop the Queen’s tyranny. At the time, he wasn’t interested in helping, but he could see her hope, and did as much as he could to help her.

“I was a coward,” he told her softly. “I was scared...of everything, of facing the inevitable, and Alice helped me realize that I couldn’t continue running from those fears. I had to do something about it, or I was going to be in pain for a long time.”

“What was scaring you?” Grace asked. “Is it because of the nightmare?”

Jefferson’s breath came out in a quiver, but he hoped she didn’t hear it. “I’ll show you, okay...I’ll show you.” 

He led Grace through the woods, it was difficult to navigate when it moved around, but he remembered where to go.

“Why do they look like that?” she asked once about a few signs that were upside down, or pointing to the sky, others making no sense. 

“You’ll get where you’re going if you know the path,” he told her.

“What path?”

Jefferson grinned at her, “Any path will do, we have to believe in what we want, and we’ll get there in no time.”

Grace laughed, and all Jefferson could think while leading Grace along a dark empty path was when she smiled in the forest around their cottage, the warmth of the filtering light through the trees that touched her soft face. The kindness that filled her eyes, and the excitement that sang in her voice. 

She always wanted to stay with him, and he had always left. 

The guilt was there, a seed once sown pitifully without his realization until the vines began to wrap around his body, tightening its hold as thorns eased out, and began to make him bleed. 

_ “Don’t leave me.” _

And he had, on many occasions, even how much she begged. He left her alone without any reassurance he was going to return. 

“I have something for you,” Jefferson said as they reached an abandoned house that was surrounded by a thick fog. Large mushrooms had grown from the soil, and layered the area, but they managed to get past it. 

“Did you live here?” she asked him.

“Once,” he told her, opening the door, and walking inside. It was a small house with a single bed sitting against the wall, a table on the side, and several hats cluttered the house with cobwebs and dust. He pushed them aside while Grace stepped over to the bed. 

He watched her reach for a white bunny he had made while he had stayed in Wonderland. His loneliness provoked him to make him a bunny, but it also reminded him of his daughter. Of one day giving her the doll, but he had forgotten it in his elation to leave Wonderland. 

Nothing else mattered but Grace and his wife. 

And now, it was only them and this bunny. 

“Is this yours?” she asked, sitting on the bed, holding the bunny. 

“It was,” he said, tossing the defected hats to the side and plopped down beside her, “but it was meant for you.”

“Me?” Grace said, her eyes twinkling, “you made this for me?”

“Well, it did help me sleep,” he said. 

Grace leaned against him, smiling at the bunny. “Thank you, Papa.”

“It’s not what I came here for, but it’ll have to do,” Jefferson said. 

Grace smiled, hugging the rabbit to her chest. “You’re not going to leave me again?” 

“I didn’t say that,” Jefferson said, smiling, “but no, I’m not going too. I shouldn’t have even considered it an option...I guess that’s the fear coming back to me, reminding me of what I could lose if I chose the wrong path.”

Grace lifted the bunny and touched its nose with Jefferson’s. “I thought you already know your path.”

“And I keep choosing wrong, and getting lost in everything…”

“What did you choose?” she asked him. “Now that we returned for the bunny?”

Jefferson smiled down at her, his heart filling up and pushing away the fear in his chest. “You, Grace, you’re the only option I should choose. Nothing else matters.”

“Does that mean we can go home?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said, rising from the bed, and taking her offered hand, while the other held the bunny to her chest. “Let’s go home.”

When they left the house full of hats, Grace had taken out an apple, and passed one to Jefferson, while she munched out on one by herself.

“Can we come back again, and spend more time here?” Grace asked.

Jefferson sighed. “I don’t know, I still have to look for a job now that I’m not going to be a _portal jumper_?”

“A what?” 

“Nothing, Grace…let’s just go home.”

**Author's Note:**

> It's 4am, so don't mind how rushed the ending might be. I'm tired. I should be sleeping, but here I am, writing fanfic about a deadbeat father realizing he shouldn't be leaving his daughter to eat mushrooms (gross). I didn't want to add that whole Regina leaving him in Wonderland, and Jefferson getting his head cut off. I'd rather give him a different back story where he was afraid of being a parent, before realizing he should get his shit together since his wife just died. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed.
> 
> Comments and/or Kudo's are appreciative.


End file.
